My Name is Harry, Not Harold!
by USMCcAnthem
Summary: "After everything I've done, I think I'll most likely die from boredom." How Harry Potter died and what exactly happened after. (Featuring Paranormal Investigators) One-shot! Complete!


_Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter._

* * *

><p>How Harry Potter managed to die would shock many who didn't know him, but to his closest friends, it was more amusing than shocking. Having managed to survive a troll, a basilisk, dementors, deranged psychopaths, mass murderers, a dragon and so much more (too much to truly list) many people believed that Harry was immortal. The rumours that he had collected all three of the Deathly Hallows – which was said to gift immortality to the holder of them – did nothing to change this belief. However, to his friends and family, they knew it was nothing of the sort.<p>

Actually, when one of his children – a morbidly curious Albus Severus, who had been a little busy bee the summer after being sorted into Ravenclaw – asked him how he thought he would die, he'd answered, "After everything I've done, I think I'll most likely die from boredom." So when he actually _did _manage to die from complete and absolute boredom, it shocked none of his family or friends. It actually was a big joke for them, as they knew he'd be happier on his next great adventure with his family and surrogate uncles. The only person who _wasn't _happy during his funeral was the man who had ended up boring Harry to death, his cousin Dudley. Dudley had invited Harry for a round of beers at a local pub in an attempt to get closer to his cousin after so many years estranged. And then he'd _killed _him while talking about his job of all things.

Needless to say, he ended up in therapy for six months before he managed to get over it with the help of his new girlfriend (and therapist).

Now this might be the end of this story, for the main character has surely passed on to the afterlife to live happily ever after with his deceased family and friends. Sadly, this was not the case. Harry's spirit and essence was so infused with magic that, well, he hadn't been able to move on at all. Actually, he found himself _stuck_ in a no-name pub in the middle of a respectable (read: boring) town a little ways from London. This, obviously, pissed him off to no end. Especially since only muggles would visit the pub, meaning that no one could see him at all! This, of course, was extremely frustrating.

Thus, with a silent (to the muggles, that is… he'd gained an unbecoming habit of talking to himself) vow to the Marauders, Harry set about making his time in the little no-name pub entertaining… for him.

From that time on, people would swear that they could feel someone whispering in their ear, or that someone had dragged their chair out from under them. There were also the times when liquor would disappear, which was when people would begin to hear off-key singing and even more activity to occur. (Harry thanked Merlin that he managed to become a poltergeist, or his death would've been more boring than the monologue that had killed him.) Eventually, people started to – accurately – blame these happenings on the most recent death that had occurred in the pub. Unfortunately for Harry, they all believed his name to be Harold and the random nutters who showed up would always call him "Harold" never Harry.

However, Harry was a rather benevolent man… err, ghost, and thus let it all slide. But fifty years after his death, he was getting a bit irritated.

"Harold?" A man called, standing in the dark bar with a camera panning the room. Another, squatter man stood a little ways away with a fancy camera that showed the room in distorted colours (Harry didn't understand the point of it, but he didn't exactly have a chance to catch up with muggle technology during his death.) "Harold, are you here?"

"Yes, you bloody bastard," Harry answered crossly. "And it's Harry you dunderhead!" He was channeling Snape at the moment, feeling very much like the man when forced to work with slow minded children. "Can't you do your bloody research right? It hasn't been that long since my death and not _everybody_ has their name shortened."

"Hey, hey, Paul, I see a cold spot," the short man whispered enthusiastically. "It looks like a man too!"

"So Harold is here," the man – Paul – was nearly dancing on the spot.

"It's HARRY!" Harry yelled, very vexed by the guy. "Honestly, pay attention." Really, Harry should've been an actor, as he was doing some spot on impressions; first Snape and now Hermione, who knew what he would do next?

"Ooo, I think I heard something!" Paul whispered loudly. "Did you hear it? I think Harold was confirming his presence."

Harry made the motion of choking someone as he resisted the urge of slapping the man. Honestly, they were bumbling foals for all the knowledge they held.

"Hey, hey, Harold moved! He'd making a weird hand motion!" The guy with the funny colour camera that could obviously see him exclaimed. Harry wondered if the guy had a speech impediment that made him say 'hey, hey' whenever he started to say something.

"It is _Harry_, not Harold, not Hadrian and most certainly not Harrigan!" Harry ranted, he'd heard many different forms of his name, and he was not amused. "_Harry_, say it with me now, _HARRY!_ H-A-R-R-Y! Harry! You know, like Prince Harry and that famous bloke with the weird hair? Harry, not Harold!"

Both the men were obviously so excited with their success they could no longer stand to be in the pub with him, which was fine by him; the arrogant sods could off themselves for all he would care. They left him alone and soon Harry went back to his passive aggressive pranking on the unsuspecting folks of the pub whose name Harry could never remember. (Harry was pretty sure the name had changed at least fourteen times by now, so he didn't think it mattered much.) However, a few months later (he wasn't exactly keeping count) the two dunderheads came back, this time with more fancy equipment and more people.

And they called him Harold again.

"FOR THE LAST TIME, MY NAME IS HARRY! NOT _HAROLD_! IT IS HARRY JAMES BLOOD POTTER!" He yelled at the top of his lungs, pissed off from being called the wrong name for the past fifty or so years. He had been annoyed enough by being called 'boy' and 'freak' when living with the Dursley's, and the 'boy-who-lived,' the 'chosen-one' and the 'man-who-conquered' by the wizarding world, but really, this was just too annoying. Was it so hard to find the obituary and realize what his name was? Sure he had joked all those years back with Dudley (in an attempt to make the meeting a little more lively, an attempt that obvious failed) that his name must now be Harold for all the droll and stiff conversation they were going about, but that didn't make it his name, did it? "PLEASE KINDLY RESTRAIN YOURSELVES FROM CALLING ME THE WRONG NAME AND DO SOME BLOODY RESEARCH BEFORE YOU TALK TO ME AGAIN!" Harry then went to rant on the other misdeeds and indiscretions of his life, deciding that if he was going to yell, he was going to do this nice and proper.

An hour later, he was panting and feeling the lightest he had ever felt since he had died. And when he blinked, he found himself no longer in the dark, dungy area of the pub, but in a field filled with sunshine and his family surrounding him.

He did not know that the one of the reasons he ended up finding happiness was because the only woman on the team of paranormal investigators had looked up their resident spectre on the web and found out that his name was not, indeed, Harold, but Harry. (The other was because of the unconscious use of magic to make his voice loud enough so that the tape recorders would be able to pick it up nice and clearly had finally detached him from the mortal plane.)

"I wonder how annoying it must be to be called the wrong name for fifty years." She'd wondered aloud, not knowing that she and her team would learn just _exactly_ how annoying it was.

And thus was the story of one of the most fascinating men in the wizarding world. How he died in such an anticlimactic way, and how his passing to the afterlife was just as bothersome.

* * *

><p><em>Fin.<em>

* * *

><p><strong>AN:**

So my dad was watching this ghost hunting show and the guy was all like, "John? Are you there John?" And, of course, I decided in all my sugar high intelligence to poke fun at it. And then that led to this. Amusing? Probably only for me, but I decided to share with you all my one o'clock in the morning humour while I'm supposed to be studying for my Italian mid-term. Well, I guess I better sleep or something...

Buonanotte!

USMCcAnthem


End file.
